Prakash Resigns

Fiction

This time Prakash Pande’s resignation was final. The metro train that rolled by parallel to his office on the second floor of a monstrous building in ITO was witness to it.

“Are you sure you aren’t making a mistake?” His boss, Obhijit Choudhary, asked. He had asked the same question a couple of months back when Prakash had tendered his resignation saying that he couldn’t report lie after lie anymore.

“See, Pande,” the Editor-in-Chief Choudhary advised him then, “your resignation is going to make no difference to the policies of the India Chronicle, let alone stir any fat asshole on Parliament Street to make the faintest of a fart. We are sold, man, lock, stock, and barrel.”

Obhijit da counselled Prakash to stay on and understand the system thoroughly so that later when he got the chance he could write a book about it. “You are one of the best journos we have, man,” said Obhijit.

Prakash stayed on. And he went on to foist propaganda in the name of news. Whatever favoured the ruling party found space in the news pages. Whatever went against it found place in the dustbin.

Lies became truths. Falsehood became sacred scriptures. The past was rewritten. The future looked ominous.

Forget Kashmir which can now never be saved, thanks to what we did there in the last four years. Forget demonetisation’s monsters. Forget the endless price rises. Forget the fads like renaming places or erecting statues. Now even the farmers are being sold to the corporate bigwigs. The latest is that the private insurance companies are reaping crores and crores in the name of farmers who are actually dying slow deaths. Praksh couldn’t take it anymore.

“What are you going to do now?” Obhijit asked picking up Prakash’s resignation letter.

“Taking up vanvas for a year.”

“Banbas?”

“Going to do B.Ed.”

“Then?”

“The classroom is where the revolution should begin.”

Obhijit Choudhary stared at the young man, the promising journalist, before averting his eyes to look at the Delhi Metro train rolling on a few metres away on its elevated tracks.

“I hope you won’t become a Maoist,” the Editor-in-Chief muttered as if to no one.